We were lucky to have 26 days to explore the Philippines. Coming primarily to attend a wedding and spend Christmas and New Year’s with family we extended our stay even further stretching dauntingly into the realm of unpaid leave. Though with a bit of savings in the bank, the apartment vacated, and the car set to parking insurance it became quite achievable and relaxing.
We entered the Philippines via Taipei on a very late flight on board Cebu Pacific arriving in Manila around 4AM. The Philippines, particularly surrounding Manila is notorious for its traffic. Therefore, for the most part we tried to be strategic about our flights keeping them either very late, very early, or on weekends.
When you travel to a country that is comprised of over 7,000 islands you are forced to make some decisions. Do you head for the well-established touristy jewels like Boracay or El Nido in Palawan? Do you shop, eat, and learn the history in the city centers of Manila, Cebu City, or Davao? Swim with the sardines and Whale Sharks in Cebu? Scuba dive to shipwrecks in Coron? The chocolate hills of Bohol? Or join the party at the rising Siargao?
Of these options we decided to go with Cebu, Coron, and Manila. Spending a week in both Cebu and Coron, and the remainder of our time in Manila and surrounding areas. Our first destination for the blog will be Cebu with Coron and Manila covered in a separate post.
Cebu City to Moalboal
In the early morning we departed Manila for Cebu City which serves as the gateway to our planned destinations of Moalboal and Oslob in the southern portion of the island.
First some important considerations for navigating your way through the country:
Transportation & Communication
Given the duration of our time in the Philippines it made sense for us to get a local SIM card for Lorelaine’s phone. We went with GLOBE*, costing 40 pesos ($1) for the SIM, and loaded it with 500 pesos ($15) worth of prepaid balance covering the duration of our stay including some data usage. This is important because we made use of an app called GRAB** (an equivalent to Uber in Asia) for our travel in the cities as public transport is slow and limited in the major cities.
*GLOBE has a variety of promotions that serve any trip duration. GO Combinations will give you access to phone, text, and data usage which can easily be found with a google search to meet your needs and the duration of your stay.
**GRAB is easy to use but can be limited if you’re going longer distances in the city. At times it took us about 20 minutes to find a driver to take us between Intramuros and the outskirts of Manila. It will also charge your credit card in the local currency so keep that in mind as conversion charges stack up quickly against your budget.
When we reached the Cebu-Mactan airport we booked a GRAB to take us to the South Bus Terminal where we caught the CERES*** bus that would take us the rest of the way down to Moalboal. The GRAB to the bus station was about $15 CAD and 3-hour journey from Cebu City to Moalboal was less than $5 CAD per person compared to the $150 dive centers and resorts will quote you for the journey.
Register with Grab using our code "GRABWALKTHROUGH" to earn free rides.
***CERES covers a majority of the tourist spots on the island circling every 30 minutes or so. All you need to do is wait on the side of the road by the bus stop, throw your hand up when it comes by, and pay in cash. Its also equipped with AC which is a real nice touch. Once you make it into town you can tricycle anywhere for about $1-3 CAD or rent your own scooter for $5-10 CAD.
Cash is king in the Philippines
One important thing to note with Moalboal and the other island towns in the Philippines is that credit card use is minimal, pay pal typically comes with a hefty 5-7% fee, and ATM’s are unreliable. Withdrawing cash is also a bit expensive in the Philippines. The banks slap on a 250 ($6) peso fee per transaction and limits you to withdrawing 10,000 pesos ($250) at a time up to a max of 40,000 pesos ($1,000) per day. This is in addition to what your bank back home is taking and a banker’s conversion rate. This part is a bit frustrating as many of the dive companies will only accept cash forcing you to incur about $50 in additional fees for the cash withdrawal. We we’re lucky for Moalboal with this but had to take the hit in Coron. Something to keep in mind when budgeting your trip. Although it feels a bit discomforting travelling with a sack of cash its unfortunately the best option. In Moalboal we attempted 5 different ATMs unable to access any of our cash. In Manila and Cebu City, you won’t have any issues.
Moalboal (3 Nights)
Arriving in Moalboal we met up with the mother of one of our friends from Edmonton. In typical Filipino fashion we were greeted with a feast. From her place we were driven to our hostel, J&C Guesthouse where we learned a critical lesson: Book AC rooms. Not just for the heat, but for the fact that the room is sealed making it cleaner and safer. Having to keep your window wide open to your room while your gone all day is not very comforting, though we didn’t have any issues. Overall, the place was not very clean, especially the bathrooms. We left a day earlier than our initial four day booking and took it as a lesson: In South East Asia don’t book the cheapest option. An extra $5/night can go a long way, and always AC!
We had 3 nights and 4 full days in Moalboal with the main purpose being for me to complete my PADI open water diver certification with Savedra Dive Center, and Lorelaine to do a refresher course. Moalboal is famous for the quality of its scuba diving and snorkelling, but also has plenty of restaurants (including vegetarian options), beaches, and other excursions for those that aren’t comfortable throwing on the tank. We were a bit surprised by the town, expecting it to be much more developed. There were stray dogs everywhere, but they aren’t aggressive just a bit of a nuisance to have next to you in a restaurant.
Here is how we spent our time:
White Beach
On the first night we got in we took a tri-cycle out to White Beach. Moalboal town proper doesn’t have much of a beach area, but White Beach is a beautiful spot, and is only about 10 minutes away. There is no shortage of people here, but we didn’t have an issue finding a place to ourselves as the beach is quite large.
Scuba Diving & Snorkelling
I requested Savedra to provide me with the PADI E-Learning materials so that I could do them from Manila prior to arriving on the island. If you have the time I would recommend this as you can learn at your own pace and not be forced to waste a vacation day in the classroom of a scuba shop or your hotel room, which will likely have limited or no WIFI. Most dive centers will have no issue sending you over your access to the PADI online materials as its about an 8 - 12 hour undertaking of modules and quizzes. After the learning modules I was ready to begin my two days of confined water training and four open water dives. Savedra had a nice pool area for this with direct access to ocean for me to begin my open water after the confined training.
The diving in Moalboal is world class. The reefs are colourful, sea life plentiful, and the sardines run is a very unique experience that can only be seen in a few areas globally. Its very accessible and convenient here, and is not limited to scuba divers. Snorkellers can rent a mask and fins for about 100 pesos ($2.50 CAD) and take a short swim out from the shoreline to reef wall and be amongst the swarm of thousands. A friend of ours recommended that we do both as it is a very different perspective. Scuba diving allows you more freedom to swim among them or be beneath them, but snorkelling has a real feeling of vulnerability that adds some excitement as you look on from the surface.
The house reefs were where I did a majority of my training, and I decided on doing an addition dive to Pescador Island, which was one of my favourites. Lorelaine had done it on her own while I was training, and my trainer had encouraged me not to miss it.
Kawasan Falls Canyoneering
Another activity that we didn’t have time for was canyoneering. Another big draw to the Moalboal region. Something we will certainly have to try somewhere else or on a return trip to Cebu at a later date.
Restaurants
There are plenty of restaurant options in the town ranging from traditional Filipino to western. The prices are quite reasonable as well. $10 CAD can easily feed two people with drinks included.
A couple of our favourites was Ven’z Kitchen and Lantaw Restaurant both around the diving center. There are also plenty of cafes in the area with our favourite being Shaka. They serve cold pressed juices and smoothie bowls which is a big nutritional help as Filipino dishes, though delicious, are not exactly vegetable oriented.
Oslob (2 Nights)
After our stay in Moalboal we hopped on the Cere’s bus in Moalboal town proper and made our way to Oslob. Oslob will always be memorable to us as the place we swam with whale sharks and the place we got engaged, all in a day’s work.
We stayed at a great little guest house named, Stay N Save. The place is off the main road right beside a Cere’s bus stop, and only five minutes from the whale shark excursion center. They were very kind to us, the rooms were clean, food tasty, and the Wi-Fi was good by Philippines standards. They offer both treehouse AC rooms and a cheaper tenting option, though an AC room only set us back about $20/night. There is also water access down a long set of stairs leading to a private beach area when the tide is out. It was down here that I proposed, becoming the first to do so as we were later told by the owners. The owner was very generous in offering us a celebratory bottle of wine and the set up of a three-course romantic dinner overlooking the ocean.
We highly recommend this place if you’re in the area, it’s a very charming and unique spot that quickly became very memorable and a highlight for us.
Whale Sharks
Outside of enjoying the beach area and the guest house area the main purpose of our time down here was the opportunity to swim with the whale sharks. An experience shared with another 200-300 eager tourists no matter what time of day. We were down there by 5:45AM and nowhere near the front of the line. They take you out on traditional boats and have set the whale sharks to a morning feeding time guaranteeing that you will see them.
Though it was an interesting experience to see those grand creatures in the water there was far too many people for it to be enjoyable. We only snorkelled due to our ATM cash constraints, which ran us about 1,000 pesos ($25 CAD) per person, though I’m not sure the scuba diving experience would have been much different.
I asked one of the Savedra dive masters about his opinion on it, and whether it caused any harm to the whale’s natural feeding or migrating patterns. He informed me that apparently, they do have some marine biologists onsite, and that studies have been conducted that confirmed the whales were still vacating the area. The boats they use are also rowed by the locals not burning fuels. It seemed to me that they were making reasonable consideration for the health of the whales and their environment. We weren’t even allowed to wear sunscreen as it caused oils to enter the water.
*If you are pressed for time or would rather just stay in Moalboal where there is more available, they do offer morning tours where they provide the transportation down to Oslob and back.
Cebu City (1 Night)
After spending our second night in Oslob, we made our way back to the big city in the land of plentiful ATMs and visa acceptance. I had some points and after all of our hosteling we decided to go for a hotel in the city, Appleton Hotel on Lapu Lapu, not far from the airport. It cost about $70 for the night but was convenient, as they offered an airport shuttle at no additional cost for our morning flight to Coron.
The city is a pretty nice place with lots of higher end resort options, shopping, food, history, and museums. However, after a long bus ride we opted to stay within walking distance of our hotel and headed across the street to the Outlets at Pueblo Verdes. The area here is quite modern and has some great shopping options and restaurants. We had some pizza at Greenwich, which is essentially a Filipino Pizza Hut, and then headed for the famed Zubuchon for some lechon (pig roast).
After some feasting and shopping we headed back to our hotel to get some sleep before our early morning flight from Cebu City to Coron for the second week of our island hopping.
Overall, Cebu has a lot to offer, particularly those interested in scuba diving. Its inexpensive due to the Canadian exchange rate, has ease of transportation, widespread English language use, and full of natural beauty and tasty cuisine.
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